Experts describe gang, drug scene in Santa Cruz

SANTA CRUZ -- Preventing kids from joining a gang comes down mostly to one thing, according to a former gang member who spent time in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay State Prison.

Steering young people into healthy after-school activities such as football, soccer, dance or kickboxing would go a long way to keeping them out of gangs and a subsequent life of violence and crime, Willie Stokes of the Black Sheep Redemption Program told the Santa Cruz Public Safety Citizen Task Force on Wednesday.

"The critical hours are 3-9 p.m. after school," Stokes said. "That's what I call the critical hours. If there's nothing set for the kids, we're going to lose them to the streets. We have to invest as much as we can."

Wednesday's task force meeting at the Police Department centered on gang culture and gang-related crime countywide as the 15-member group works to find ways to improve safety in Santa Cruz.

The other speakers were Mario Sulay, commander of the Santa Cruz County Gang Task Force; Nane Alejandrez of Barrios Unidos; and officer Joe Hernandez, a gang specialist with Santa Cruz police.

According to Sulay, there are approximately 1,000 documented gang members across the county, most of them in Watsonville. About 64 percent of the gang members are men younger than age 25, he said.

However, gangs don't pay attention to boundaries and Santa Cruz -- primarily the Westside, Lower Ocean and Beach Flats -- is plagued with its share of gangs and gang-related drive-by shootings, homicide, assault and robbery, he said.

Roughly 72 percent of arrests by the gang task force are in Watsonville and 28 percent in Santa Cruz, Sulay said.

Gang activity fluctuates, often staying calm for a few weeks or months until something sparks a crime wave.

"It doesn't take much to trigger a violent incident," Sulay said. "It could be a wrong color of a shirt. We've seen that."

Task force members asked questions about the role of drugs in gangs and how to get a handle on the city's ongoing drug problems.

Stokes, who started selling drugs at age 15, said drug trafficking is the main source of revenue for gangs.

"That's what gangs are built on. Their No. 1 money-maker is selling drugs," he said. "I know, it's what I used to do. Eighty-five percent are dealing some kind of drug activity."

Alejandrez, who started Barrios Unidos in 1977 to stop gang violence, said he believes racism and the economy are factors in giving gangs a perpetual foothold in society.

"We haven't done a very good job as adults (at stopping gangs)," he said. "We blame our young people, but what have we done? We need to dig deeper, myself included, to make sure we take care of our children."

The task force will meet weekly throughout October. The group's next meeting is 6 p.m. Wednesday at Branciforte Middle School, where the public is invited to make comments.

A report to the Santa Cruz City Council with recommendations for making the city safer is expected in November.